


The Dulled Edge Of A Blade

by Appolinariusthepurplegladiator43



Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Post-Embrace the Void Ending (Hollow Knight), Short & Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-04
Updated: 2020-09-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:15:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26287837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Appolinariusthepurplegladiator43/pseuds/Appolinariusthepurplegladiator43
Summary: The Pure Vessel takes up their nail once more.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 29





	The Dulled Edge Of A Blade

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RadiantVoid](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RadiantVoid/gifts).



> I'm sorry.

Silence.

_Their "empty" gaze lowered, too heavy for them to hold high._

A sound they have yet to become reacquainted with.

_Their legs shook, their body too heavy for them to hold steady._

So used to Her screams, the venomous curses and promises dripping with hate...

_The heart they had always tried to ignore is broken, the weight of the souls they'd dammed too heavy to bear alone._

Silence was an old friend they had been waiting, yearning, to find again...

_Falling, the world spun. Their knees were graced with polished stone, their hunched body slumping tiredly. The quiet thump of their wiry form was drowned out by the echoing clatter of metal on smooth rock._

When they had accepted the anguish they had felt.

_Black stained the gentle grey floor with a soft plip. A strange strangled sound they were never supposed to make wracked their thinned torso. Their form is shaking again, for different reasons unknown to them this time._

It's sad, isn't it?

_They reach their fingers up from the tile to touch their mask: they come away with the sheen of moisture. Looking at the cracked Great Nail, the only thing that had remained by their side, it's scratched surface showed them exactly what they were._

How time continues to roll along and one is simply expected to roll along with it.

_An ache ripped through their forsaken shell, dragging their soul deep into an inky black sea unlike the comforting embrace of Void._

How the world turns grey before one can truly see its colour.

_A soft thought came to the mind they had never wanted to acknowledge they had. They and their weapon were one and the same. Trained into prime form and broken, beaten by time. Dulled and damaged. Useless. Partners in honour and shared misfortune._

How the withered corpse of the happiness of what could have been can bring so much pain.

_More black stained their Father's white legacy as a grating painful cry yanked their heart out of their chest for all who listened to hear. Their singular hand gripped the tattered cloak draped lazily across his quivering shoulders._

Perhaps in a better world...

_Fat tears rolled down the blackened front of their mask, ugly hoarse sobs pouring out of them from vocal chords fashioned out of the spite of a vengeful goddess. They leaned forward until their head touched the cold pale tile, curling themself into a spindly ball of emotion they don't know how else to express._

Where they weren't so consumed by the fear of failure...

_The Vessel's frail body was overcome by the throbbing sorrow in their soul. Their silent suffering from years in the Black Egg had been left to fester, only now being released into seconds of unimaginable heartache._

They might have found another way...

_They cried for all the innocent bugs they'd failed in the pursuit of approval, of affection from the ones they loved and admired most, that died because of his want to make his Father proud._

The infection might have been stopped without the need for sacrifice...

_Their lament subsided but their tears did not. Their fingers found the rotted and cleaned stump of what used to be their right arm, rubbing the dips in their shell where glowing pustules and boils of infection resided._

And they might have been happy.

_Tearing their remaining hand away from the scars, they slowly pushed themself back up onto their knees. They wiped their eyes, even though the emotion still poured out, and they sat up straight._

But this was not such a world.

_They stared at their weapon laying beside them._

They were still scared.

_They ran their fingers along the pale ore absently. It was still relatively smooth and strong._

They were still useless, without purpose.

_Lifting the tip of the mighty blade, they gazed upon its marred exterior..._

But that didn't mean they didn't deserve to be happy. To feel loved.

_And upon closer inspection fount the tip still sharp. Their eyes widened as dark Void dripped onto the polished floor, the small cut weeping not unlike they had been moments before._

They were impure.

_A tiny spark ignited inside them._

They had a mind to think, a will that will be breakable and a voice to cry out to everything that would hear them.

_The broken knight lifted their ruined body from the cold tile, their lonely hand clasped tightly around the hilt of the tarnished weapon they were not yet worthy of wielding._

They weren't perfect and they did fail...

_The deceivingly sharp blade scraped the grey floor as they lifted the heavy nail._

But it didn't matter.

_They haphazardly sheathed the tall weapon on their back and left their sorrows with the fading memory of the White Palace._

They had done what they could and if they could do more, they would be all too happy to.

_The next, and last, time ~~the Hollow Knight~~ Hollow visited their "childhood" home, they returned as the Pale Prince of Hallownest, the 5th Great Knight and next in line to the throne. Their nail was the best it had ever been and their mind and body were back up to standard. The Prince wore a refined version their old, white armoured cloak, not out of necessity, but out of pride._

They found purpose.

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little something I threw together. Hope you liked it.


End file.
